Up Until Now

by Petrea King

  An air of secrecy surrounded any conversation about the miners’ search for the elusive ‘big one’ that would ensure their financial future. But some of them showed us into their caverns, which were accessed vertically down carved-out holes with small hollows for hands and feet. At the bottom, perhaps 6 or more metres down, tunnels big enough to stand up in spread to our left, right and straight ahead. The glint of brilliant and fiery colours flashed magically from the dark red earth as our torchlight fingered its way into the tunnels. It was easy to understand the allure of—if not addiction to—the search.

  Sometimes John and I drove even further out, all the way to Thargomindah, just to have some private time away. I loved that he understood and shared my desire for solitude and reveries in nature. Our privacy was an illusion, however, because even though we might drive 200 or more kilometres from town, John’s vehicle was bound to be recognised. The bush telegraph crackled alive with the news and, after one such weekend, I returned to the homestead only to be greeted with a question about the state of the road out to Thargomindah.

  When you’re with someone you love, it’s like being with the best parts of yourself, and so it was with us. We often camped out in swags on these journeys and shared the joys of cooking simple meals on an open fire, then staring into the depths of the heavens as the stars put on their nightly show.

  John was a gentle and undemanding man who preferred our love to grow from friendship. This suited me well, as I was reluctant to have any man come near me after my first disastrous sexual experience. I couldn’t bring myself to share my shame about the attack, so John believed my shyness was due to my scars—he was deeply respectful of the trauma I’d endured in hospital. It was easier for me to let him believe this than to tell him that my hesitancy around physical intimacy was a result of feeling sexually violated. In time, his gentleness, respect and love provided the safe harbour I needed to heal and grow past this trauma, though I never told him about it.

  By the time the question of our marriage loomed on a nearer horizon, we both reluctantly realised that the life of a country woman isolated in the bush wouldn’t work for me in the long term, and we sadly and gently took our leave of one another. We both recognised the inner restlessness that kept me searching for fulfilment.

  When I did marry some years later, John visited me to ensure that I was happy and as he said, ‘With a man worthy of loving you.’ I was very touched by his kindness and concern for me, and I’ve often wondered what became of him. I never saw him again, though I did hear that he left Australia to volunteer his agricultural skills in a developing country.

  CHAPTER 7

  The land of the long white cloud

  By 1969, after a year out west, I was limping less and decided to apply for work as a roustabout in the shearing sheds of New Zealand. A tiny ad in The Land newspaper leapt off the page at me: I was ready for another adventure, and I wanted to remain in the countryside because I still found the intensity of cities beyond my endurance. I also thought that I could continue improving the strength in my legs by engaging in hard physical work, but I had no idea what lay ahead!

  The shearing ganger, Hector, was based in Palmerston North. My parents had friends there, the Cartwrights, so I set off on this wonderful year of freedom with a base among friends. The Cartwrights were very welcoming and gave me my own bedroom along with a key, encouraging me to come and go as I pleased. I got along well with them, though I was still a very private person. While I was adept at putting others at ease by getting them to talk about themselves, I largely kept my own self quite private—maintaining a facade was a well-practised art.

  The day after I arrived, a motley crew of Australian girls met in Palmerston North to get to know one another and hear a little of how the shearing gangs worked. This included understanding the rhythm of the days, our duties and what would be expected of us. We eagerly piled into dilapidated vehicles and followed Hector’s equally decrepit truck as we left the city’s confines behind and entered the luscious green New Zealand landscape. The contrast with where I had come from was profound.

  ***

  New Zealand sheep are very different from the merinos I was familiar with. These were smooth-skinned British breeds without the many skin folds under the neck that slow down any shearer’s progress towards relieving the sheep of its fleece. A ‘gun’ shearer could shear about one sheep per minute from 5 am to 5 pm with an hour each for breakfast and lunch, and half-hour breaks for morning and afternoon smoko.

  For a gun shearer, divesting four hundred sheep per day of their wool was standard. And, after nine months, I was working in a gang of twenty gun shearers, which translated to eight thousand fleeces processed each day. But initially I worked with a team of four or five shearers and the same number of roustabouts, as we moved from farm to farm to shear each flock.

  We worked every day that the sheep were dry—which meant, at one time, forty-two days straight. When it rained, we downed tools and took a rest while we waited for fleeces to dry. On these days, I limped through mile upon mile of the lush and beautiful countryside, loving the sound of water that trickled, bubbled, splashed, cascaded, dripped, babbled and flowed so abundantly everywhere. After my time in western Queensland, the amount of free-flowing water seemed extraordinary.

  The shearers and roustabouts called me ‘the Abo’ because of the frequency of my wanderings. Some days I joined them at the pub after our work was done, then had to drive them back given they could barely find their keys, let alone their car. But mostly I preferred my own company and would drag my leg up hill and down dale, determined to see what I could of this bounteous and luscious land. The brilliance of green grass dotted with white sheep was such a novelty.

  I was determined that my legs wouldn’t stop me from living my life. Motivated by a sense of frustration, I forced myself to do things best done more judiciously or perhaps not at all. I would, for instance, if no one was watching, make myself ascend stairs two at a time, even though holding the handrail while walking more slowly and consciously would have been kinder.

  The shearing sheds provided plenty of opportunities to strengthen my muscles, as did my wanderings. I loved being out in the elements, and rainy days never stopped me.

  ***

  I buddied up with a great girl from northern New South Wales who was likewise looking for adventure as a roustabout. Barbara had left school at fourteen to work on her family’s dairy farm, and I liked her straightforward manner and innate good humour and confidence. She was a rough diamond and had a heart of gold.

  Barb was of nuggety build and could give the shearers as good as she got. There was a lot of chiacking and sending one another up, and the shearers were forever playing tricks on us.

  We were quickly initiated into many of the delicacies that the Maori shearers ate, some of which were delicious while others required a stronger stomach. They used coat hangers to hook eels in nearby rivulets, then they hung them on the clothesline until they stopped writhing. The taste of their flesh was strong and oily, and the Maori shearers loved eating them, while I found this to be quite character-building.

  We occasionally went to the seashore to gather shellfish or paua, and they made fritters from them. Paua is a kind of sea snail, called ‘abalone’ in other parts of the world, but the flesh of the paua we gathered was a rather unappetising, inky bluish-grey colour.

  Hector, the ganger or ‘boss of the gang’, was a big Maori man whom you wouldn’t choose to mess with or question. One frosty morning, Hector told Barb and me that he’d prepared a special dish to warm us up before work, as the mornings were crisp and our starts were early. He removed the lid of the simmering pot on the stove, breathed in deeply and, with a satisfied look, ladled the contents into our bowls.

  Greeted with grass, leaves, snails and other bugs steaming in our bowls, Barb and I didn’t want to offend Hector by refusing or throwing up! We gingerly dipped our spoons into this awful concoction while the shearers watched. It wasn’t unt
il the spoons were at our lips that they fell about laughing.

  ***

  The bigger shearing gangs mostly worked in the South Island, where vast stretches of land hold many more sheep than the smaller properties of the North Island. It was good that we started in Hawke’s Bay with a few shearers and the opportunity to familiarise ourselves with the rhythm and demands of roustabout duties.

  Our gang would arrive at a shearing shed in a variety of clapped-out cars and Hector’s battered truck piled high with our food. The shed and sleeping quarters always felt empty and deserted; they hadn’t been used since the last season. The night before our work began, the shearers prepared their combs and equipment. After the first day, when I walked into the shed in the evening, I would feel the buzz of humanity’s presence—the walls still hummed with the intensity of our activity. Only the day before, there had been nothing in the shed but cobwebs and an air of abandonment.

  If anyone got in the way of a shearer busy about his work, they could be knocked off their feet or laid flat out across a pen full of sheep—without apology. This generally only happened to someone once, or twice if they were very slow. The simple rule was to never get in the way of a shearer: he was paid by the number of sheep, and anything that slowed him down wasn’t appreciated, to put it mildly.

  Each roustabout had one of three jobs, and we rotated through them during the day. One job was to work with three shearers, broom in hand, keeping the area meticulously clean and carefully separating the top-knot wool, the belly wool and the crutch wool; each of these was swept in a different direction, and the roustabout needed to quickly synchronise their efforts with the shearers, who might all be at different stages of releasing the wool from the sheep. Then, as the fleece gradually fell away in soft folds from the sheep’s body, the roustabout arranged the wool so it would be easy for the pick-up roustabout to whisk away before the shearer brought out the next sheep—and so the cycle would start again.

  The second role was picking up fleeces and throwing them onto the wool table for cleaning and classing. A capable roustabout could pick up three fleeces, drop two and throw one on the table. It was imperative that fleeces were picked up the moment the shearer finished, or he would walk right through the soft folds of wool on his way to choosing his next sheep. For the roustabout, being mindful of where each shearer was up to was vital if you wanted to work as a skilful member of the gang. Three or more fleeces on the floor created havoc but were also hard to avoid at times. Given that the shearers took no heed of anyone or anything other than shearing as many sheep as possible, it was the roustabouts’ responsibility to deal with the resulting chaos.

  The third role was on the table, where any contaminated wool around the leg, crutch or neck was removed so that the fleece was clean and consistent in quality. Nimble fingers were necessary, and no matter how fast I became, the Maori roustabouts were always faster. It was mesmerising to watch their dexterous fingers flying through the wool, removing grass seeds, thistles or dirt and ensuring a uniformity of the fleece.

  I loved the speed and precision of all three roles, but my favourite was working with the broom and closely monitoring each shearer’s movements while reading his next intention. This was like mindfulness meditation, as we needed to remain present to what was happening moment by moment—the consequences of not being present were brutal. When our gang synched with one another, we were in ‘the zone’, though that term hadn’t yet been invented. It was just a joy to work together silently and so intimately, with no time to think or to feel inadequate. I found a deep satisfaction and sense of fulfilment in the quietness it brought to my mind.

  I was already familiar with practising a sense of presence due to the instability of my legs. It is easy for me to rip ligaments, tendons or muscles if I move carelessly, so the increased imperative of coordinating my efforts with the shearer’s added another layer to the intensity of concentration, which I loved. A quiet mind is a delight, especially when it provides respite from self-criticism or self-consciousness.

  Because of my experience as a nurse, I was also given the job of sewing up the sheep that were accidentally gouged by the shears. I found it hard to witness these wounds, which were inflicted upon the poor creatures when they struggled and caught the shearer unawares. It didn’t happen often, as the shearers were highly skilled; I probably stitched thirty gaping wounds during the year I was there.

  Not only did I have to accept the suffering of these sheep as part of the job, but there was also no point in maintaining a vegetarian diet. The amount of food we consumed was staggering, and special diets certainly weren’t catered for. Occasionally I would score the job of cooking for the gang, a mammoth task given the considerable appetites of up to fifty people. The kitchens were often basic or worse, and occasionally we needed to remove livestock from our quarters or the kitchen before we could settle in and unpack.

  We woke at 4 am, showered, dressed and ate a couple of rounds of hot toast and tea before starting work when the bell sounded at 5 am. For breakfast we ate a large bowl of steaming porridge followed by two lamb chops or sausages, two eggs, mashed potato, steamed cabbage, toast and tea. Morning and afternoon smoko were the same: cheese on toast or scones, butter and jam, and mugs of hot tea. Lunch was roast lamb or lamb curry plus rice, veggies, toast, pudding and tea. Dinner was soup, a casserole with lots of vegetables, plus pudding. And we would always have toast and tea before bed.

  I weighed fifty-five kilos when I arrived and fifty-two when my year was up. I had never eaten more in my life, but I’d never done such hard physical labour either!

  ***

  The rhythm of our days was interrupted when a member of our gang, Brad, had a terrible car accident. I was particularly fond of him. On learning that he lay unconscious and badly injured in Palmerston North Hospital, I immediately hitchhiked down from Hawke’s Bay to take part in his bedside vigil with his distraught parents and siblings. I didn’t feel very well myself, but I was so preoccupied with Brad’s precarious situation that I put my own needs aside.

  At the end of the first night, I was about to go to the Cartwrights when I collapsed in a chair near the hospital entrance. A kindly doctor was passing by, and on inspecting me found that I had the beginnings of what became a 10-centimetre band of shingles extending from my bellybutton around to my spine. I was admitted into the hospital.

  I’d succumbed to pneumonia every winter for years after my hospitalisations, and now shingles had laid me low. I’ll never forget the searing, stabbing pain: each jab was like a burning knitting needle being thrust through my body.

  It took some weeks until I was ready to return to the Cartwrights and ultimately back to the gang. I resumed the daily routine of a roustabout but stayed on the sorting table for a while, which was less physically demanding than the other two roles.

  Sadly, Brad never rejoined us. His brain damage was severe, and I left him to the care of his loving family.

  ***

  After nine months, I was considered a ‘gun’ roustabout by Hector and the shearers. This meant that I was put into the fastest team of twenty shearers and twenty roustabouts, all Maori except me. They were a wild and wonderful group who told amazing stories, and it was a great privilege to work with them. If they didn’t go to the pub, they would build a fire outside for after-dinner gatherings and sit around telling stories.

  I never quite felt I belonged among them, even though they did their best to make me welcome. We worked as a skilled and cohesive team, but when knock-off time came I was mostly left to my own devices: long walks, writing letters home to family, meditation or reading.

  It was difficult to find books that I wanted to read, given we were usually miles from the nearest town—and, when the opportunity arose, I often chose not to go in. The shops were generally closed by the time the shearing gang descended upon the nearest pub. Occasionally I’d join them, and we’d down jug after jug of beer before weaving our way up winding and sometimes precipitous roads to o
ur quarters. I often wondered how the men functioned after the previous night’s drinking; I suspect they sweated out the residue by lunchtime. Shearers weren’t known to live long lives, and often their later years were painful, with damaged backs and arthritic knees and hips. Drinking helped them cope with the demands of the job.

  I enjoyed a beer or two, but my main distraction came from the natural world. I’ve always found nature to be a wonderful teacher, so I spent many hours savouring the abundant wonders of the rugged south of the South Island. I would sit on a rock and gaze at the sublime view, smell the rich fecundity of the earth, listen to the drip of water or watch the industry of insects.

  Meditation and contemplation were my closest companions, and mostly I was content to keep that part of my world private and separate from my outer life and relationships. My inner world flourished while I still struggled in social situations. I was painfully preoccupied with my own shortcomings and failures, and guilt and shame continued to infiltrate my sense of self. I became more adept at deflecting interest in me by asking questions of others, and they were happy enough to talk about their own lives without seeming to notice my tactic.

  ***

  I found it hard to warm to the presser in our gang. His job was to pack wool into boxes, then ratchet the pair of boxes together to create bales. These bales were sewn closed with a large needle and string, stamped with the name of the farm and set aside for collection.

  To pack the boxes, the presser would jump up and down on the fleeces to compress them as much as possible. It often took the strength of two men to accomplish this feat, but our presser was quite singular in his abilities. He was a giant man who had lost one tattooed arm above the elbow. He also had tattoos on his face, chest and back—and I imagined elsewhere, but certainly didn’t ask if I could inspect them.